When electronics was young - part 2:

Birth of the battery

Count Alessandro Giuseppe Anastasio Volta (1745–1827)
belonged to an aristocratic family and was Professor of
Physics at the universities of Como and Pavia. He became
interested in a phenomenon described by Galvani in 1786 to
the effect that “an electric spark, or contact with copper and
iron, causes a frog’s leg to twitch”. This gave rise to the, fortunately
short-termed, belief that animal tissue was necessary
for the generation of electricity.